If your a fan or a past fan this is a good Roc Doc. Not as good as Rush: Beyond the Lighted Stage (I'll do a reveiw of that later.) but still pretty good.
For those of us who were young and coming of age in the early 90s it captures a great moment in Rock History (And more so if you were a scenster or Musician at the time)
There was a brief time from 1991 to 1993 when good music came out of the underground and outpaced the corperate machine. When good music got airplay on MTV and more than just College Radio and actually dominated and this Doc brought me back to it.
Bands like Soundgarden (My fave at the time), Alice in Chains, Nirvana, Red Hot Chili Peppers and Pearl Jam as well as to a smaller extent Sonic Youth, Primus,NIN, Dinosaur Jr. Rollins Band, Jane's Addiction, Mudhoney, the Pixies, Ministry, the Cult and to a even smaller extent Fudgetunnel,Screaming Trees, Blind Melon, Helmet, Last Crack, the Melvins and the like were out and about and getting attention and gaining fans. It was our generations musical and cultural late 60's.
It was a time when what was popular was not sucker corperate drones.
a time whe you would go to a party wearing a Fuck Corperat Rock! shirt from SST records and hear many of the above as well as Slayer, old school hardcore like Black Flag and good album cut classic rock and roll.
The film captures all that time and the rise of one of it's best bands and their friends.
itshows the Mother Love Bone days and the effet of it's frontman's Andrew Wood, Herion OD death had on the whole scene and how Gossard and Ament picked up the pieces with the help of McCready and Soundgarden's Chris Cornell and Matt Cameron on the Temple of the Dog album (One of my top 5 of all time) and the recruitment of Vedder.
But also shows when it got overexpossed, repackaged and when the corperations got wise and pushed their own copy bands like Stone Temple Pirates, Candlebox, Creed and the like.
It takes you through their overwellmed period, their fight with ticket master and their change in band dynamics, musical direction and McCready's drug problems. A s well as Vedder's problems with dealing with overwelming fame and attempted control by the corperate machine.
It goes into their collaberation with and mentorship by Neil Young. "For once their was an adult in my life who was leading by example" says Vedder.
You go through their self impossed step back.
And the irony of how a band who's frontman idolized the Who was center of a trajic crowed crush incident involving 8 deaths. It shows how this effected the band.
You see them today and even if you don't like them it's hard to deny their ability of musicians.
I was a Mother Love Bone Fan and was into TOD as the Seattle scene went from a noticable thing (but to be fair it did not seem bigger than the South Florida Hardcore/Thrash/Deathmetal scene and saw Pearl jam on their first tour before they were not as big as Alice in Chains or Last Crack. I was so close I could see scratches on Mc Cready's Start's pickguard. I was floored by that show and it was another thing for me that encouraged my drift away from my scene's orthidoxy to embracing the music I grew up on, letting my blues flag fly and developed a sense of fearlessness about mixing genre's so this film was a big treat for me.
It was also cool to watch my 9 year old who is developing a love of music watch it with intrest and see him moved by the music. Our cracking up together while they should a scene from Celebrity Death Match where a Claymation Vedder round kicks a Scott Strepthroat from Creed's head while demanding his voice back. =D>
I give it
out of 5.
